Gawker [who owns Kotaku] has been hacked

[Another World]

People like you are the reason that Twilight, Justin Bieber, and any movie by the Wayans Brothers makes money. Simple minds are easy to capture

i'm gonna get you sucka' is a timeless classic.

-another world

 

[ShadowSoldier]

Having fun wasting your time? You're really not getting to me. Talk about your high "intelligence" all you want, the fact is your trying to stir shit on a forum board that deals with video games. Who's the bigger idiot I wonder?

Here's a hint, it's not me.


Anyways:

I've confirmed that my account wasn't compromised. There's a name similar to mine, but it isn't it. So that's a bit of a relief.

 

[Urza]

Having fun wasting your time? You're really not getting to me. Talk about your high "intelligence" all you want, the fact is your trying to stir shit on a forum board that deals with video games. Who's the bigger idiot I wonder?

Here's a hint, it's not me.

Yet you make another post in my direction, complete with a baseless insult? No contradiction there

Bed time now I suppose. Enjoy the thread.

 

[YayMii]

ARGH. I was affected by this. Douchebags just put spambots on my Facebook.

Whatevs. I just changed my password, and I changed my password here just to be sure.

 

[Sir-Fritz]

Some classic urza in this thread

Ontopic: You would hope they step up their security after an attack like this.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

Some classic urza in this thread

Ontopic: You would hope they step up their security after an attack like this.

They did, they brought in a security firm or something to step up their protection.

From what the article says, people who had good passwords, were alright. People who had meh passwords, depending on what they were, were either safe or not. People who had crap passwords, were screwed.

I had a meh password, but luckily it worked.

 

[Sonicslasher]

If your password is around 6 characters or less, does not have caps or is a letter from the dictionary, I highly advise you change it. As in right now. Because it's probably somewhere on this list of 188 thousand passwords in this text file.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

If your password is around 6 characters or less, does not have caps or is a letter from the dictionary, I highly advise you change it. As in right now. Because it's probably somewhere on this list of 188 thousand passwords in this text file.

Yeah. I wasn't affected, luckily. But I still changed it just in case.

Reading a bunch of sites [it seems a number of sites each have different information that the other doesn't], it seems that 4Chan [who is being accused here], and Gawker Media have a bad past. As something happened in the summer with an author Adrien Chen. That case involved an 11 year old girl. But still, scary.

Here's one site that has some information that I never seen:
http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared...er_hacked_b.php

Here's another site:
http://www.mediaite.com/online/exclusive-g...nd-his-actions/

We have been cracking the database for about 17 hours and have managed to retrieve 273,789 passwords. If our release schedule wasn’t so tight we could get 500,000+. Included in the dump are passwords linked to accounts from Nasa, about every .gov domain you could imagine and hundreds from banks.

QUOTE

On an interesting side note there are 2650 users in the database using the password “password” or “querty”. Of these users one is registered under a .gov email address, 3 are from a .mil addres and 52 are from .edu addresses.

Protip: Don't use qwerty or password as your passwords. They're already taken -_-

 

[Law]

protip: use password or qwerty as your password for throwaway accounts on websites like Kotaku that nobody cares about. Don't use your regular password.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

Forbes has probably the best detailed history so far. Apparently it started last month with the hacking.


The Lessons Of Gawker’s Security Mess

 

[mameks]

Classic Urza is classic

My password's uncrackable

/bullshit
But yeah, my password's slightly different on every site, and the important ones have unique ones, such as:

Spoiler

Yeah right, like I'd tell you

 

[science]

I lol'd.

I also thought the whole Gawker thing was kinda funny, too.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

To think, the bosses refer to it's readers as peasants, doesn't care that our stuff is being given out, makes their authors cover their asses, and doesn't even give an apology.

I love Kotaku's Michael McWhertor [or however you spell his name], Brian Ashcraft, and Brian Crecente, but they could have been affected as well, and they're the ones stuck apologizing.

 

[Oveneise]

Hmm... I didn't have an account there so it really doesn't affect me. But I wish these hackers would use their knowledge for good, instead of using it for destructive purposes. What did the hackers have against "Gawker" anyway?

 

[Deleted_171835]

lol, gawker

 

[wolffangalchemist]

I don't read Kotaku, nor do i care for it, Though i gotta admit anyone who boast about being "unhackable" and then proceeds to call hackers "script kiddies" is asking for it.
In any event even on a site so minuscule in usefulness and redundant as Kotaku.
Now i might be more alarmed was this youtubes stuff cracked or something much more robust community wise.
I think i'll just read EGM since it's been my favourite site and magazine for my gaming news and will do so unless they try and leave us again.

 

[ShadowSoldier]

Hmm... I didn't have an account there so it really doesn't affect me. But I wish these hackers would use their knowledge for good, instead of using it for destructive purposes. What did the hackers have against "Gawker" anyway?

I'm copying and pasting what i've found out. It's not confirmed but so far this is the most likeliness of cause:

They wanted to just bring Gawker down a peg. I've been reading numerous sites as they all have different information.

But here's what I can tell, I could be way off. It's a bit of a read though.

In July this year, this 11 year old girl was being bullied. Why? Because she was talking shit and everything, giving threats. The author of that post works for Gawker, was Adrian Chen. Anyways, 4chan caught wind of the girl and started cyber bullying her. They managed to get her home phone number, email address, home address and everything. People were sending things to their house like pizzas and other crap. And then people started prank calling her with death threats and everything. Her dad caught on and tried to scare the trolls saying he knows who they are and he backtraced them and crap like that. Bluffing basically.

After the death threats came in, Police Investigation went underway. And at the same time this whole thing was happening, Adrian Chen was posting updates over on Gawker. And after the whole thing got too far, Adrian called out 4chan calling them shit and whatnot. And 4chan threatened to bring down the site. They only slowed it down, and Adrian started bragging saying they're not scared and what not. Egging them on.

Anyways, 4chan stepped their game up, hacked his stuff, his home address, possible phone numbers, all the personal info. Then things, basically calmed down from what I have read.

Then this happens and Gawker Media assumes it's 4chan. Though Gnosis says they are not related or anything. They just wanted to bring down Gawker Media who thinks they're all high and mighty and what not. Here's some more links:

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared...er_hacked_b.php

and

http://www.mediaite.com/online/exclusive-g...nd-his-actions/

But it's all speculation. Nobody knows what's going on. Saying it's 4chan is just a stab in the dark. Gnosis says they aren't related or anything, they just wanted to bring Gawker down a peg.

But, if it is related to that 11 year old girl/4chan/Adrian fiasco back in July, then wow. I'm not saying it is, but wow.

And the girl in question is a girl named Jessi Slaughter. Some meme's have been started about her.

 

[Oveneise]

Update: The torrent which hosted the compromised passwords and the accounts has been taken down by [Blankzorz]. I'm not sure if the hackers took it down, or the admins but I see this as good news.

EDIT: Nevermind, its back up. o.o

 

[ShadowSoldier]

Take out the name of the site in your post.

 

[Oveneise]

Update: The torrent which hosted the compromised passwords and the accounts has been taken down by the [Blankzorz]. I'm not sure if the hackers took it down, or the admins but I see this as good news.

EDIT: Nevermind, its back up. o.o

Take out the name of the site in your post.

Now, you gotta take the name out of my quote. o.o
Gotta keep these things hush-hush, you know?